Chapter fourteen — a VIsitation of spirits

 

 

From the Captain’s Log, Star Date 4202.0:

I do not suppose anyone will ever piece together exactly what happened on all the battlefronts at the moment the Organians were let loose from their planet-wide prison. Some of the myriads of incidents, however, are reflected in reports which reached the Enterprise officially, or were intercepted, and were duly entered by Sulu as Captain pro tern. Even most of these, of course, are virtually incomprehensible, but in some cases we had previously encountered the Klingon officers who were involved and can guess how they might have behaved or what they were confronted with; and in others we can reconstruct approximately what happened with the aid of the computer. But the total picture must be left to the imagination, and the computer has none — perhaps fortunately for us.

If the universe were shrinking at the rate of a centimeter a day, and all our measuring rods were contracting with it at an equivalent rate, how could we even suspect that anything was happening?

Commander Koloth sat before the viewing screen of the Klingon battleship Destruction as silent and motionless as a stone image. In the navigation tank to his left, points of green light showed the deployment of the rest of his force, faithfully keeping to the formation — an inverted hemisphere — he had ordered when they had left the Organian system, but he never looked at them. He knew that the squadron was following his orders — indeed, the thought that they might not be never entered his head. In any event, all his attention was focused on the quarry, the tiny red spot in the center of the viewscreen, a spot which represented The mightiest machine ever conceived by Terran humanity — and soon to be nothing but a cloud of radioactive gas.

Days ago, he had determined that the Federation ship he was pursuing was the USS Enterprise, a discovery which had transformed his feeling for the chase from ordinary military pleasure to one of almost savage joy. He had encountered — and been defeated by — James Kirk and his command on two previous occasions: the affair of the Xixobrax Jewelworm, and the dispute over the colonization of Sherman’s Planet. The latter occasion had been the most serious defeat for the Empire, and therefore for Commander Koloth, for the Empire most correctly was not forgiving of failure; but what rankled with Koloth personally was not any diplomatic consideration, nor even the setback to his own career, but the fact that as a last gesture of seeming contempt, Kirk had somehow managed to inflict upon Koleth’s vessel an infestation of loathsome, incredibly fertile vermin called tribbles. It had taken the better part of a lunation to get them all cleaned out.

He repressed a shudder and touched a toggle on the board before him. “Korax.”

His first officer appeared as if by magic. “Lord Commander?”

“Any broadcasts from the enemy?”

“None, Lord Commander, or I would have informed you instantly. Nor have they changed course or relative velocity.”

“I can see that much. In extremity, Federation vessels drop a buoy containing the Captain’s Log, for later recovery. I see no chance that the Federation could ever pick it up in this situation. However, neither do I want it destroyed in battle. See to it that we detect the drop, and pick up that buoy.”

“We are at extreme sensor range for so small an object, Lord Commander.”

“All the more reason to exercise extreme vigilance. The buoy will emit some sort of recognition signal; scan for it.”

Korax saluted and vanished. Koloth continued watching the screen. Nothing could save the Enterprise this time; she was moving straight into a trap — she could in fact do nothing else — which would crack her like a nut. He hoped that he would be the man to make the actual kill, but it seemed probable that the admiral in charge of the much larger Empire force awaiting ahead would claim that privilege. Net only was that normal — rank has its privileges — but Koloth knew that Admiral Kor also cherished personal desires to rid the universe of Kirk and his ship, or at least had reason to.

Well, that was not of final importance. What counted was not who obliterated the Enterprise, but the fact of the obliteration itself. And that end would soon be accomplished…

For what Koloth did not know was that it had taken him a Klingon year simply to call Korax; that the entire galaxy had made its twenty-seventh rotation since its birth around its center during the course of their conversation; and that since then, it had gone around three and a third times more. For the Destruction and all aboard her, Time was slowing down on an asymptotic curve; and for Commander Koloth, the chase would never end.

…and Koloth would never knew it.

Koloth’s estimate for Kor had been mistaken; that was one reason why Koloth was still a Commander — and would remain one now, forever and ever, even after the whole of the universe had died — while Kor was now an Admiral. It had been Kor who had been involved with Kirk in the struggle on Organia which had resulted unpleasantly in the Organian Peace Treaty, but Kor harbored no resentment.

He did not regard that outcome as a defeat, but simply as a frustration. Federation and Empire forces had been positioned for the final struggle when the Organians struck them all powerless, on both sides, and imposed their terms; and Kirk, Kor judged, had been as offended at the intervention as Kor had been. These Federation officers tended to strike one as milksops until fighting was inevitable, but thereafter they were formidable antagonists. The penetration of the Enterprise this far into Empire territory spoke for itself: an act of great daring, and worthy of a warrior’s respect.

That it was also foolhardy did not bulk very large in Kor’s opinion; only cowards avoid battle when the odds are against them. Kor also knew that Federation starship captains had more freedom to act against orders, more discretionary powers than he would ever be allowed to exercise; though he was sure that this fact would contribute to the downfall of the Federation in the long run — and perhaps very soon now — it made him all the more appreciative of Kirk’s boldness, to say nothing of his ingenuity.

It would be interesting to know what Kirk had hoped to gain by such a foray. Insofar as Kor had been told, there was no such place as Organia any more, and the Organian system was no longer in a strategic quadrant; yet the Enterprise had ducked and dodged to get there with enormous doggedness, and in the process had quite failed to do any of the damage to real military targets within the Empire which Kor would have obliterated en route as a matter of course, especially on a suicide mission.

One could allow only a certain weight to ordinary curiosity — after all, Kirk could not have been sure that Organia was extinct; why, then, had he not gone in shooting? He could, for example, have knocked out Bosklave, which was well within his reach and unprepared for a starship attack. Surely he knew where it was, and that its destruction would have been a bad blow to the Empire. But instead, he had done nothing but wipe out the token Organian garrison — a rather neat piece of entrapment, that — and then go right back to the Organian system, thus setting himself up for the present cul-de-sac without charging the Empire any real price for it. Wasteful — and more than wasteful: mysterious.

But that was the trouble with democratic societies: they shared with the Empire all of the disadvantages of bureaucracies, and none of the advantages of hierarchy and centralization. Sooner or later, even a brave but prudent commander like Kirk, and a multimillion-stellor investment like the Enterprise, would be lost to some piece of bad judgment, or even to a whim. Fighting the Federation had been interesting, certainly. but Kor was just as glad that the long war — or, until recently, non-war — was about to be over. Fighting the Romulans, the next society on the Empire’s timetable of conquest, would be more fun; the Romulans were short on imagination, but they were as brave as eglons, and they had the military virtues — discipline, a hierarchy of respect, a readiness to place society above self, an ernest poetic willingness to live with tragedy, and above all the good sense to realize that good government consists of weighing heads, not just counting them.

Under the present circumstances, it would be possible to capture the Federation ship, which would be a valuable prize. The odds against her were now hopeless, and Kirk would not sacrifice the four hundred and thirty people in his crew — mere than a third of them female, a most irrational Federation custom — in a suicide stand; few Federation captains would. But Kor’s orders from the High Command were for complete destruction.

He did not even think of asking questions, but no amount of loyalty or discipline can prevent a humanoid creature from speculating. He could only conclude that Kirk and his officers had found some piece of information so important that the High Command was willing to throw away a Class One starship to make certain that it never reached the Federation, or even could. Whatever the information, Kor himself would no doubt never find out what it was…

“On the contrary,” a gentle voice said behind him. “I believe I can help you there.”

Even before turning in his command chair, Kor knew the voice was familiar, though it was not that of any of his officers. A sensation of anticipatory dismay began to build in him.

And for good reason. The voice, he saw now, was that of the Organian Elder, Ayelborne, who had been temporary Council head when Kor had attempted to occupy the planet.

“So,” the Klingon said stolidly, controlling his expression with the training of a lifetime. “I was told Organia was no more. It appears that my information was inaccurate.”

“At best, incomplete,” Ayelborne agreed, with his well-remembered perpetual, maddening smile. “And the war is over, Admiral Kor. Your ships still have power, but you will find that your weapons do not. I would advise you to make planetfall, with your entire fleet, as soon as possible.”

“My orders,” Kor said, “are to destroy the Enterprise. If my weapons are inoperative, I can nevertheless still ram — which will cause an even greater loss of life.”

“I know your orders,” Ayelborne said. “And I observe that your courage has a match in your stubbornness. But my advice is sound, for within three Standard Days your ships, too, will become inoperative, and if you are not grounded by then, the loss of life will be greater still — and all on your side. In view of the Klingon breach of the treaty, I am not obligated to give you this information, but I do so in the interests of minimizing subsequent violence. In fact, I would not be here at all, Admiral, did I not need from you the exact coordinates of your home system.”

“I will never — ” Kor began.

But Ayelborne had already vanished — and Kor knew with gray despair that, regardless of his will, his mind had already given the Organian the information he had wanted — and that Kor the ruthless, Kor the efficient, Kor the brave, Kor the loyal, was a traitor to his Empire.

The Grand Senate of the Klingon Empire, alarmed by the fragmentary reports of unprecedented disasters coming in from the field, was in session when the Organians arrived. There were three of them, but they appeared in the barbaric, gorgeously caparisoned Senate hall, a relic of a recorded ten thousand years of internecine warfare before the Klingons had achieved space flight and planetary unity, in their perhaps natural forms — balls of energy some six feet in diameter, like miniature suns — so that it was not possible to tell them apart or distinguish which ones they were (if indeed their identities had not been from the beginning as much of a convenient fiction as their assumed humanoid appearance). That they were Ayelberne, Claymare and Trefayne is only an assumption, based en merely human logic.

The swarthy faces of the Grand Senate were pale in the actinic glare emitted by the thought-creatures. When one of the Organians spoke, his voice echoed through the great chamber like the sound of many trumpets.

“You have broken the treaty, and been the direct cause of much death, misery and destruction,” he said. “In addition, you have committed violence against ourselves, which only the action of your adversaries stopped short of genocide.”

“Untrue,” the Senator in Chief said coldly. His voice was shaky, but he seemed otherwise to be in command of himself — no mean feat under these circumstances. “Our planetary thought-shield was no more than a method of confinement, to prevent you from meddling further in our Imperial affairs.”

“Your intentions do not alter the facts,” the Organian said. “You understood only ill the nature of your own weapon, and its effects upon us hardly at all. Five years under that screen — and we see in your minds that you never intended to let us out, and indeed dared not — would have destroyed us utterly. Putting such a screen around the Earth, as we see you also planned to do, would have destroyed humanity as well, and far more quickly. Such carelessness compounds your crime, rather than mitigating it.”

“We defy you,” the Senator in Chief said.

“That will avail you nothing. However, we are not vindictive; our justice is not based on vengeance. We simply observe that you cannot be trusted to keep treaties, even those backed by humane coercion. We therefore interdict your planets, and all your colony worlds, from space flight for a thousand years.”

The hall burst into a rear of pretest and rage, but the Organian’s voice soared above it easily.

“After a millennium back in your playpen,” he said, “you may emerge as fit to share a civilized galaxy. I say may. It is entirely up to you. And so, farewell, Klingons — and the Klingon Empire.”

 

Chapter Fifteen — “YOU MAY BE RIGHT”

 

 

From the Captain’s Log, Star Date 4205.5:

It has taken a good many hours, and the participation of all department heads, to prepare a comprehensive — and what is more important, comprehensible — report of this entire imbroglio. And even after the report was filed, there were a number of additional questions from Earth, which is hardly surprising. However, we were able to answer them, and our role in freeing Organia has won us official commendations from Starfleet Command, which I have passed on to all hands.

There remain some additional questions which Command has not asked us, which is probably just as well, for I am far from certain that we know the answers — or ever will know them.

Kirk paused in his dictation and Spock, who had been monitoring the recording of the Log entry into the computer, turned from his station toward the command chair.

“May I ask, Captain, what these questions are? It is possible that I could be of assistance.”

“I think perhaps you could, Mr. Spock.” Kirk put the hand microphone back into its clip on the control board. “Some of them, in fact, concern you — which is why I was hesitating about logging them.”

“Why should you, Captain?”

“Because they are more or less personal, and in addition, not essential for Starfleet Command’s understanding of the affair. You needn’t answer them yet if you’d prefer not to.”

“I could make no judgment of that,” the first officer said, “without knowing what the questions are.”

“Obviously. Well, then…While we still had the replicate Spock on board, you were absolutely adamant about refusing to cooperate with him, and upon the need for his destruction. Yet at the same time you refused to explain the source of your adamancy. This was a considerable danger to you personally, because both attitudes were so unlike you that — as I told Dr. McCoy at the time — they caused me to wonder if you were the replicate. In fact, for a while I was nearly convinced that you were.”

“I see,” Spock said. “I have no objection to explaining that, Captain — not now. You are aware, of course, that because of my Vulcan inheritance, I have certain modest telepathic gifts.”

“Aware? Great heavens, man, they’ve saved our lives more than once; how could I forget that?”

“My question was rhetorical,” Spock said. “You are doubtless aware also that true telepaths are exceedingly rare in the universe, which is most fortunate for us, for as adversaries they can be exceedingly formidable.”

While he spoke, McCoy and Scott came onto the bridge; Sulu and Uhura were of course already there. Kirk looked inquiringly at Spock, but the first officer showed no sign that he found the addition to the audience at all objectionable.

“They can indeed,” Kirk said, “if our experience with the Melkotians was a fair sample.”

“Yes, or the Klingons’ with the Organians. But for the purposes of the present discussion, it is the rarity of the ability that is of interest. It has never been adequately explained. One hypothesis is that many humans may be telepathic at birth, but that the ability burns out almost immediately under the influx of new experience, particularly the burden of pain of other creatures around them.”

“It blows its fuse,” Scott suggested.

“Something like that,” Spock agreed. “Another hypothesis is that for any type of mind which depends upon an actual, physical brain for its functioning — as opposed, say, to energy creatures like the Organians, or mixed types like the Melkotians — the forces involved are too weak to make transmission possible, though extreme stress may sometimes help — except, perhaps, between two brains whose makeup is nearly identical as in the case of twins. There are many instances recorded in Earth history of apparent telepathic links between monozygotic twins, but fewer of such links between heterozygotic twins, who are born together but are genetically different.”

“I begin to see,” McCoy said. “The replicate’s brain was even more like your own than an identical twin’s could be — and you had a telepathic rapport with him?”

“Yes and no,” Spock said. “Bear in mind that although his brain was essentially mine, its biases were opposite to mine — even its neural currents ran in the opposite direction. The link between the replicate and myself was not telepathy, but something I should call ‘telempathy’ — an emotional rapport, not an intellectual one. I could never tell what he was thinking, but I was constantly aware of his physical sensations — and of his emotions.

“I will not describe this further, except to say that I found it very nearly intolerable. However, it gave me all the assurance I needed that his motives, his morals, his loyalties were all the opposite of my own. Yet intellectually, without doubt, he had at his command all my experience, all my accumulated knowledge and training, even my reflexes — and all my intimate knowledge of the Enterprise, its crew, and the total situation. And hence, I knew that he was a terrible danger to us all, and under no circumstances could he be negotiated with. He had to be eliminated, preferably before he could get in touch with the Klingons (though unfortunately he did), there was no other possible course.”

“Fascinating,” McCoy said. “So the second hypothesis now stands proven, apparently.”

“I would say so,” Spock said, “insofar, that is, as testimony can ever be accepted as evidence. I am personally convinced, at any rate. Of course, even if valid, logically it does not exclude the first hypothesis; both may be true.”

“That may well be,” Kirk said, “but it still leaves me with some loose ends. Why didn’t you tell me this at the. time, Mr. Spock? It would have saved me considerable fruitless worry, and would have speeded up the solving of the problem of the two Spocks — maybe before the replicate could have gotten away.”

“If you will pardon me, Captain,” Spock said, “such an outcome did not seem to me to be at all likely. The replicate Spock’s identity had yet to be proven by his actions; there was no other way to be sure. And even had you accepted my explanation, you would on reflection have realized that the rapport involved might seriously impair my efficiency or judgment, or make me, too, dangerous in some unpredictable way. I knew I was in control of myself — though it was precarious — but you could not. It would have occurred to you, further, that it might have been safest to confine me as well until the identity problem was solved — and for the good of the ship I needed to be a free agent, or in any event a free first officer.”

“Hmm,” Kirk said. “That also answers another of my questions: how you knew when the replicate was no longer aboard the Enterprise, and roughly where in space-time he was instead — and again, why you refused to tell me how you knew.”

“Precisely. May I add, Captain, that I did not come to these decisions entirely unilaterally? I asked the computer what your probable responses to a proposed revelation of the ‘telempathy’ might be, and was told that your confining me was highly probable indeed — about eighty-three per cent, to a confidence limit of point zero zero five. Ordinarily, I would have preferred to have consulted Dr. McCoy on a psychological question of that kind, but under the circumstances I was denied that recourse.”

“I see,” Kirk said. “Very well, Mr. Spock, we won’t transmit this additional information to Starfleet Command, unless they specifically ask for it. I don’t see how it could enhance their present understanding of our report, anyhow. But you had better record it in the library. It may be of some value to the Scientific Advisory Board, should they have any project on telepathy going, or want to consider starting one.”

“Very well, Captain.”

“Another message from Command, Captain,” Uhura reported. “We’re to report to Star Base Sixteen for two weeks down time and a new assignment. Incidentally, the communications officer there, a Lieutenant Purdy, wants me to teach him Eurish. I hope he’s cute.”

“Very well. So ordered. Mr. Sulu, lay a course.” Kirk paused for a moment. “And I will add, Mr. Spock, that it’s nice to have you back.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Spock said. “It has been an interesting experience. I myself have only one regret: that my method of disposal of the replicate had to be so improvised that I was unable to recover your class ring for you.”

Kirk gestured the subject away. “Forget it, Mr. Spock. It was a very small price to pay, and I can always get another. I’m only grateful that there are no more loose ends than that.”

“I’m afraid there is still a loose end, Jim,” McCoy said thoughtfully. “And what’s worse, it’s the same one we started with, way back on the benchmarking job. But maybe, after his ‘telempathic’ experience with the replicate, Mr. Spock can answer that one too.”

“What is it?” Kirk said.

“This,” McCoy said. “Does the man who comes out of the other end of a journey by transporter have an immortal soul, or does he not?”

There was quite a long silence.

“I do not know,” Spock said at last. “I can only suggest, Doctor, that if someone were to give me an answer to that question, I would not know how to test the answer. By operational standards, therefore, such a question is meaningless.”

“I suppose so,” McCoy said resignedly. “Somehow I thought that was just what you’d say.”

Kirk had rather expected Spock’s response, too. But he noticed also that the first officer looked, somehow, faintly worried. Or did he?

 

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